Sega’s Shining Resonance: Refrain is Coming West for PS4, Xbox One, and Switch

Sega has announced that Shining Resonance: Refrain is coming to the west this year. The HD remaster of the 2014 Japanese-only PlayStation 3 game was announced for the PlayStation 4 in Japan last November, but sources within the company have confirmed to us that the game is also coming to both the Nintendo Switch and Xbox One when makes its western release.

Shining Resonance: Refrain was the only traditional RPG title from the series to be released on PlayStation 3. Having been released so late, about a year after the PlayStation 4’s launch, and with Sega’s well-known reluctance to bring Shining titles to America, it had always seemed very unlikely that the title would ever come to western shores. The HD remaster gives that opportunity to a more modern Sega with a more active localization branch to bring the title here. So this one actually reflects a pretty significant change in Sega’s approach to their more popular Japanese lines. It seems like Shining Resonance: Refrain is something of a test to see how receptive audiences are of more traditional JRPG titles, so if it does well, we could see some other Japan-only Sega games get released abroad.

The remaster features better graphics, an improved resolution, and an alternate path for the game in a “what if” scenario. You can find the western release announcement trailer below.